Defense contractor KBR Inc. on Wednesday won an important legal victory in Maryland, where a federal judge was considering the claims brought by more than 50 plaintiffs -- mostly military personnel -- who accused KBR of exposing them to hazardous fumes from trash burn pits while they were serving in war zones.

U.S. District Judge Paul Titus dismissed all the complaints brought against KBR "in the national interest."

"The critical interests of the United States could be compromised if military contractors were left 'holding the bag' for claims made by military and other personnel that could not be made against the military itself," the judge wrote in his memorandum opinion. "Intrusion of the judiciary into military decision-making would not only violate separation of power principles, but also would be extremely unwise and imprudent."

This is one of the arguments that KBR has made in the case brought against it in federal court in Oregon, where a set of Oregon National Guard soldiers and veterans have won an $85 million jury verdict against the company, which was hired to restart a heavily damaged water treatment plant in southern Iraq. The plant at Qarmat Ali was contaminated with sodium dichromate, an anticorrosion compound that contains a toxic form of chromium that is a known carcinogen. The soldiers accuse KBR of knowingly exposing them to danger at the plant.

KBR has argued that it performed its job as well as it could under the circumstances, promptly notifying the Army Corps of Engineers when it realized the site was contaminated. The Oregon case, like the burn pit case, pits military personnel against the defense contractor, leaving out the the Army or the U.S. government.

In Maryland, the judge said the burn-pit plaintiffs should pursue their claims "through the military and legislative processes, not through the judiciary." That is one of the arguments that KBR has made in the Oregon case.

As the Oregon soldiers and KBR await the formal entry of judgment in the local case, KBR hopes for an outcome similar to the one delivered Wednesday by the federal judge in Maryland.